


he's my latest accessory (wanna carry him 'round all over town)

by RedHead, Swing Set in December (swing_set13)



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: M/M, barry allen becomes an accessory to all the rogues heists, he does not plan this, it just happens, it's hijinks city up in here
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-21
Updated: 2017-06-21
Packaged: 2018-11-16 19:19:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11259297
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedHead/pseuds/RedHead, https://archiveofourown.org/users/swing_set13/pseuds/Swing%20Set%20in%20December
Summary: Having a dual identity has never been so frustrating.





	he's my latest accessory (wanna carry him 'round all over town)

**Author's Note:**

> this fic started from this [idea](http://swingsetindecember.tumblr.com/post/159997469507/where-barry-allen-indirectly-has-been-an-accessory) i had which started a round robin between me and [coldtomyflash](http://coldtomyflash.tumblr.com/). we decided to flush it out and make it into a actual fic that wasn't a giant tumblr thread. you can read the thread over on our blogs. i had it under [#he's my latest accessory](http://swingsetindecember.tumblr.com/tagged/he%27s-my-latest-accessory) and [coldtomyflash](http://coldtomyflash.tumblr.com/) had it under [#heist cutie au](http://coldtomyflash.tumblr.com/tagged/heist-cutie-au). 
> 
> it was an absolute joy to write with [coldtomyflash](http://coldtomyflash.tumblr.com/) and i hope we can collaborate again sometime. <3 we commiserated over canadian tax season. it was great. a great joint venture in fic writing if i do say so. 
> 
> special credit to [pretzel-log1c](http://pretzel-log1c.tumblr.com/) for the assist in the thread.
> 
> special thanks to [pantstomatch](https://pantstomatch.tumblr.com/) for helping me tie-off one scene that wasn't really working for me despite long arduous hours of trying to make it work in a google doc.

Barry has exactly 10 minutes before he needs to be back at work before Singh notices that the CompStats report isn’t done like Barry said they were this morning. Barry has a good excuse. He saved a family of five from a burning building and helped with the rebuild so he didn’t have time to square all the paperwork that seems to be encroaching more on his day job than he’d like.

But Barry needs to deposit a cheque before the end of the day. His rent depends on it. If he wants to attempt living by himself, he needs to also remember that rent waits for no man. Not even the Flash.

So Barry is using the last spare minutes of the lunch hour at First Central City Bank in the slowest line imaginable. He has half a mind to tap the Speedforce and deposit the cheque himself with the teller’s login that Barry has already guess based on the reflection of the computer screen off the skylight and the compact mirror of the old woman in front of him. His musings are derailed when there’s a loud crash in the bank’s foyer that causes all activity to grind to a dead stop.

Cold. Captain Cold.

Damnit.

This is not what Barry needs. And he’s about to Flash away and deal with this but Cold’s gun in aiming right at him, making all eyes draw to him.

“Hands up! Nobody move!” comes the shout and people are scattering away from Barry because of course they are, he looks like he’s being targeted. He sends a very unimpressed look at the grinning Captain Cold. Who has several other Rogues fanning out behind him, weapons and meta-powers out to play. Great.

Barry eyes the clock. There’s 7 minutes left until that report is due and he’s not cashing this cheque today. Meaning his rent payment will in fact bounce. He can’t keep scaling up his building at super speed to avoid his landlord. He doubts the pre-war apartment building can take that level of force.

“We don’t need anyone playing the ‘hero’ here, so chill and we’ll be on our way in a flash,” Snart says to the crowd at large, people with their arms already up above their heads, but Barry knows it’s directed mostly at him, uncomfortably alone in the center of the room now with him in the crosshairs of the cold gun’s barrel.

Maybe he should also put his hands on his head. They’re still at his side. He’s sort of forgotten the whole ‘I’m a normal hostage’ look. He probably should look more scared than annoyed. There’s no way he can get that report done now.

“You there–” Lisa Snart says, as if on cue. “Arms up, cutie.”

Barry scowls at her and raises his arms a little – like an aborted lacklustre jazz hands. Cold looks amused, stepping closer to him with the cold gun still unwaveringly locked onto him.

“Hand over your phone,” he projects loudly to the hostage bank audience, then a more quiet drawl between his teeth, “Play nice now, Barry.”

It’s no surprise that it won’t carry amidst the din of the Rogues collecting cash and keeping an eye on the group of hostages they’ve corralled off to the side.

Barry sighs and hands it over. He hasn’t even finished paying off the tab and he never got around to syncing it with the cloud. He wonders if he can steal the sim card without Snart noticing.

“I’m really just here to deposit my rent cheque.” It’s a little too loud and gets a laugh out of half of the assembled Rogues.

“We’re really just here to rob the joint,” Mick Rory points out, coming over with a canvas bag full of cash that a shellshocked teller has filled for him. The other Rogues have similar ones. Barry frowns, a little dismayed he can’t stop this heist. He’s The Flash. He’s travelled to at least six different alternate Earths. Even one with aliens. And yet he can’t stop a bank heist. Supergirl can never know about this. He bets she never has to deal with rent checks.

“The Flash will save us!” someone in the crowd shouts. Barry winces. Not likely.

“Not likely,” Snart says and Barry scowls at him.

“If you’re all done stealing, some of us are late to get back to work,” he grits out, his hands still held slightly above his waist.

Again, a chorus of laughter. “This one’s got an attitude,” Rory says with a grin. Snart looks more smug than usual. 

“Sorry about your day job, kid. But we are going to need a hostage for the getaway.”

“Oh no, you’re not–”

“Let’s go.”

Snart grabs his arms and zip ties his wrists and that’s it, Barry is officially annoyed. “For real?” he hisses under his breath as Snart hauls him from the building by the arm.

“For real, Barry.”

“You planned this,” he accuses, thinking he’s wrong but Snart inclines his head with a smirk. How the hell did he know that Barry was going to be at the bank is beyond him, but he's beyond annoyed and pissed off when he’s shoved into one of their getaway cars, sandwiched between Snart and Rory with Lisa in the driver’s seat.

Iris is going to have a field day reporting on this, there was definitely news cameras outside that caught him on screen as the hostage. He’s never going to live it down at the precinct.

On the plus side, Singh might be too worried about him to care about the late report. Barry can always hope.

“What’s your name, cutie?” Lisa calls from the front seat. “Haven’t I seen you somewhere before?”

“I don’t think s–”

“With Cisco!” she snaps her fingers, smile turning warm. “You know Cisco Ramon!”

“Oh. Uhm,” he starts to sweat, but that might just be because Rory is a veritable furnace next to him. Barry glares at Snart for good measure before answering Lisa. “I work at the CCPD. I know Cisco because he consults with us on cases.”

“You’re a badge?” Rory asks. Barry sighs and tilts his head back.

“This isn’t my day.”

Snart chuckles next to him. “Almost over.”

They pull up to some rendezvous point and he gets none too gently shoved out of the car, and then Snart of all people is casually volunteering to take him while the rest of them make their getaway in another unmarked car. It must be outside their normal plans because it gets him a look from some of the others – Bivolo and Shawna are there too, but thankfully not Hartley – but none of them comment. Barry’s pretty sure they think Snart’s about to murder him.

Considering how Snart ruined his day, his rent payment, and his perfectly-timed plan to finish that report, Barry killing Snart is feeling more likely right now. But he gets back into the car Snart prods him into and pretends to play along.

“I can’t believe you,” he says finally, out of earshot of the rest of the Rogues.

“It was a well-executed plan.”

“How did you even know I was going to be there?”

“Your routine is painfully predictable.”

Barry refuses to believe that, and uses his speed to get out of the annoying zip tie on his wrists. “You had to cuff me?”

“Had to make it look good for the cameras. You’ll make the evening news.”

“I would’ve been happier making rent this month.”

“Don’t leave things to the last minute,” admonishes Snart, reproachfully. Like he’s the upstanding citizen.

“Oh no, you’re not about to lecture me, Snart. You just robbed a bank!”

“And got away with it. That’s the merits of good planning and a timely execution.”

Barry sighs. “I hate you.” There’s no heat in it as he presses the palms of his hands over his eyes with a groan.

“Now, now, that was fun.”

“I think the Rogues think you’re going to kill me.”

“They know that’s against the rules.”

“Shawna gave me a really weird look.”

“I wouldn’t worry about it,” says Snart, idly enough to make Barry look up and face Snart.

“Where are you taking me, anyway? Can't I just go?” Of course, he technically could, he knew that, but the heist was over and the Rogues were long gone and he was going to have to go back to work and file a report on being kidnapped and fill out a mountain of paperwork all before he could get the report he was supposed to be doing to Singh so if he was procrastinating a little, it was really only to be expected. He was, after all, just in a hostage situation.

“Figured I’d drop you off near the tracks and give you your phone so you could call the CCPD, make it look good.”

Ah. It’s a half-decent idea. Maybe better than walking into the precinct after getting kidnapped like it was no big deal. The last thing he wanted was to seem like an accomplice. Or an idiot.

“Alright,” he concedes. “But let’s agree – no more kidnapping me?”

“If you insist.” Snart seems to be in a good mood (probably because he got away with all this), with a smile that’s not really a smile but isn’t a cold smirk. It’s almost indulgent.

“Now, let’s listen to what they’re saying on the radio about this one.”

***

That should’ve been the end of it. A bank heist, the Rogues, a hostage decoy and about a mountain of paperwork and a few claps on the back waiting for him at work. Some definite teasing from Cisco and Iris thrown in to boot, a bit of light ribbing from the precinct’s bullpen and the lab techs.

That should’ve been the end of it.

***

That was not the end of it.

***

“Hold the bag, bud.”

Barry does, mostly because he has no other choice. He’s in civilian clothes – again – hail pelting the windows, storm squalling outside and wind whipping around the Weather Wizard. The Weather Wizard who had happened upon the exact corner store Barry was stopping in for an energy drink.

Mardon doesn’t _need_ to have a gun out to be dangerous, so Barry is playing it cool. The guy behind the counter looks like he’s a second away from wetting himself and fainting and Barry can’t really _blame_ him but apparently Mark is only here because the guy stiffed him on some deal last week and _really_ , Barry didn’t want to get in the middle of that, he just wanted an energy drink.

“Could you turn down the rain?” he shouts over the noise at Mardon, because he’s getting chilly. The last thing the Flash needs is a cold.

The rain abates a little and Mark spares him a half-grin. “Better?”

“Thanks.”

The shopkeeper is shoving cash and valuables into the bag Barry is stuck holding and the look he grants Barry tells him that, yeah, he thinks Barry is nuts.

“Don’t I know you from somewhere?”

Barry really wishes the Rogues would stop recognizing him from places. “Uhh…I just have one of those faces, I guess–”

“The news! You were Cold’s hostage! Wait–you’re West’s–”

“Can we skip all that? Please?” He shakes the now full bag in Mardon’s direction. “I’m also with the CCPD and I’m gonna be buried under even _more_ paperwork when I report this.”

Instead of kidnapping him to use against Joe, Mardon’s lips twitch into a smirk. “I see what Shawna meant.”

He doesn’t explain the comment and then he’s gone in a whirlwind. A literal whirlwind. It kicked up half the store in it’s wake. Barry’s a bit bemused but shakes his head. He still has a trip to the bank after this, to _finally_ cash his now-late rent. Maybe one day he’ll manage to do things on time like a functioning adult, but today is not that day.

Crap.

He forgot his wallet.

So long, energy drink.

***

On the plus side, his rent is officially paid.

On the downside, none other than the Golden Glider is asking him to hold the door.

He knows, because of course he does, that the best way to rob a bank isn’t actually to go in guns blazing. It’s far more effective to go in line to a teller, slide a note across that says you have a weapon and for them to give you a certain amount, and then carry on until you get out. Personnel are trained to do as you ask and leave it up the police after that so that no one gets hurt. Only meta-humans and melodramatic jerks like Leonard Snart rob a bank in a blaze of glory these days.

Which is why he’s pretty confident that Lisa Snart, winking at him as she walks past, full looking bag over her shoulder, just robbed this place. He really should switch banks. He’s pretty sure that banks shouldn’t be robbed this often.

“Thanks for the assist, cutie,” she purrs with a triumphant gleam in her eyes while Barry sighs, watching her leave, before going back inside to talk to the teller, already mentally preparing to file a report.

***

Having a dual identity has never been so frustrating. Especially when he works for the police.

“Allen – you’re a CSI, why are you always part of these crime scenes?” barks Captain Singh wearily. Barry shrugs helplessly. How was he supposed to know Captain Cold would rob the First National Bank closest to Jitters during the morning rush the next month?

Snart actually berated him about tax season. And the benefits of filing online.

Not to mention casually reminding Barry that his rent was due. Did Snart know his landlord? Did Barry somehow step into another alternate universe? It was bound to happen.

And yet, Barry is standing in front of his very irate police captain trying to explain why he never _plans_ to be a hostage. These things just happen.

“Only you, Allen. Goddammit, you’re supposed to prevent crimes! Not be an accessory to them!”

If Singh only knew.

***

He really did step into an alternate universe, didn’t he?

Sitting shotgun to the Pied Piper, Barry's starting to wonder. The coincidences are adding up. Maybe this is the Speedforce’s way of punishing him.

“ _Faster_ , Hartley!” Shawna shouts from the back seat, looking behind them out the back window where sirens are blaring. “The Flash’ll be here any second!”

Well technically, she’s not wrong.

“Don’t worry about him, Shawna,” Hartley grins meanly next to Barry in the driver’s seat. And then he has the audacity to wink at him. _Wink_. “I promise he’s a little tied up at the moment.”

Barry hates him a little. He is _not_ tied up. Just cuffed. In Joe’s spare cuffs.

“Can you guys drop me off on a corner somewhere, please?”

They had stolen his car. Well, Joe’s car. But they’d stolen it _from an active crime scene with him inside._ Shawna had teleported them both inside, pointed a gun at his head and Hartley put it in gear and drove off.

As soon as they had, Barry was pretty sure he solved the mystery where the stolen tech from Mercury Labs had gone. Into the backseat with Shawna, that’s where.

“Hey wait a sec,” Shawna starts and looks at him properly for the first time after his request. “ _Barry_?”

“Oh great, you learned my name,” he whines morosely, mostly to himself. This is not the way he wanted to be recognized. “Hi Peek-a-Boo.”

She squeals and kicks the back of his seat. “Good job picking the car, Hartley! We’ve got a lucky charm!”

“You have no idea,” preens Hartley.

Barry shoots him a glare. It was bad enough that Rathaway knew his identity without being so cheeky about it. The only reason Hartley hadn’t blabbed was largely to do with preventing Central City from knowing it was Cisco Ramon who outfitted the Flash. Apparently Hartley’s ego couldn’t let that happen. Cisco was right, Rathaway was a dick.

“How’ve you been since the bank robbery, heist cutie?” asks Shawna. Barry’s never been this close to Peek-a-Boo before. It’s a bit irksome.

“Employed. Which I won’t be after this stunt.”

“You can always come work with us,” she offers.

Hartley bursts out with gleeful laughter as he takes a sharp corner too fast, clipping Joe’s side mirror. Barry grinds his teeth while Shawna asks what’s so funny.

“Just watch the road, will you?”

“Sorry, I bet I’m going too fast for you, eh?” mocks Hartley before taking another turn.

“At least put on a seat belt!” says Barry which sets Hartley and Shawna into peals of laughter.

At this rate, Barry’s going to have to explain missing work and why Joe’s car is missing not one but both side mirrors.

***

“And let’s pause here for effect and–bam! Hahahahaha!”

Laughter roars out in the bullpen and Barry groans and rolls his eyes heavenward.  He wonders if he can slink further down into his chair.

There’s a video montage. On Youtube.

Singh is definitely gonna make them take it down because those crimes weren’t all processed and it was definitely someone here who made it. Barry’s pretty sure it was Julian. The editing is too smooth for it to be Patterson or Vukuvich. But the point remains. There’s a video. Of all the security footage of Barry getting kidnapped or held hostage by the Rogues and a very memorable one where he held a door open.

The latest clip is paused when CCTV caught him bickering with Bivolo when the Rainbow Raider tried to clear out an art gallery.  Very ROYGBIV – way to really lean into a theme, there.

“You think one’ve these days the Rogues are gonna put you in the ER for how much lip you give ‘em?” one of the beat officers asks Barry as what’s clearly supposed to be a gentle ribbing. He still winces at the phantom pain in his back from his last serious run in with Zoom.

There’s no way he’s telling them that he’s pretty sure the Rogues think it’s cute.

“Maybe if I’m lucky they’ll stop abducting me so I won’t have to stand up to them in the first place.”

“ _Maybe_ ,” Singh cuts in and they all stand a little straighter once they see him at the door of his office, “you should all be working. I’m still waiting on the tissue sample report, Allen.”

Singh stops, looks around at them, and then – “And try not to get kidnapped on the way up to your lab.”

Which sets off the room into another round of laughter. Even Joe laughs. The traitor. Barry knows he’s still sore about the side mirrors. _Mirrors_ as in plural. Hartley was terrible at driving stick.

***

Things get easier for Barry at work, for a few days, once everyone’s had their laugh and work piles up again.

But then it gets much, much, worse.

***

The Flash stops Mirror Master and The Top. A typical Tuesday for The Flash.  

Barry’s actually pretty pleased with himself about it, because it’s nice to face the Rogues in costume as The Flash instead of plain ol’ Barry Allen. So he’s relishing it a little, just a smidge, and makes sure he’s back at the precinct in time for them to arrive and get booked. It’s always a little satisfying when the whole places claps or cheers when major Rogues or metas who were terrorizing the city get brought in. It’s a satisfying rush for a job well done.

Dillon and Scudder are on their way to booking when Barry steps into the bullpen to revel in the high spirits of the precinct. He’s barely concealing a knowing smile when Dillon catches his eye as she's being frogmarched past.

“It’s you!” Rosa exclaims in delight, staring straight at him. Scudder looks like he’s ready to murder him as Rosa gives Barry a lingering once over.

He stiffens up as his world shifts into slow motion and colour drains from his face but Rosa keeps talking.

“The cutie from the diamond exchange!” she says with a snap of recognition. The police escorting her start laughing, the severity of booking a dangerous meta-human forgotten in lieu of another round of mocking Barry Allen.   

Barry just groans and takes a fortifying breath knowing that at least the whole Rogues gallery doesn’t know he’s the Flash, but resignedly admits defeat in having his co-workers laugh at him and how he’s apparently gossip fodder for meta-humans.

Scudder looks a little less homicidal as his scowl turns assessing as he starts sizing Barry up.

“Aren’t you the guy who Snart kidnapped at the bank that one time?”

“He sure is!” one of the beat cops claps Barry on the shoulder and Barry stumbles into Scudder and winces because great, just great.

“Lisa said you were cute.” Now Scudder is giving him what Barry assumes is a smoldering look and Rosa is smirking at her partner and nope, nope – just. Nope. This cannot be happening. 

This is the last thing he needs. He’s already sure the district attorney's office thinks he’s colluding with Snart. And now half the force is witnessing The Top and Mirror Master undressing him with their eyes. What’s next? Captain Cold? Hell would have to freeze over.

“I’ll be in my lab,” Barry says miserably and disappears upstairs, carefully avoiding looking at Joe, who’s shaking his head disapprovingly with suppressed laughter.

***

The Top and Mirror Master escape the meta-human wing of Iron Heights with no small help from Len pulling a few strings in the right places. He’s become quite the expert at prison breaks.

“Heist cutie was there, he held open the door, such a gentleman,” says Rosa. “He was visiting his dad. Who knew, a badge with a jailbird dad. He made the perfect accessory.”

Sam actually smirks. “Heist cutie was adorable. Even volunteered to be the hostage instead of that doddering old guard.”

“Heist cutie?” drawls Len from his perch in the only wingback chair in the abandoned warehouse safehouse where he was cleaning his cold gun. His prison break plan didn’t include hostages. Scudder and Dillion went off-script. Again. Especially considering the arsenal of guns they traipsed into the safehouse with.

“Our good luck charm,” says Rosa with a feral grin, high off her new taste of freedom. “So dependable and sweet. Like a puppy. Really, he’s wasted with the CCPD.”

“It’s any wonder he’s still employed,” Sam agrees.

“CCPD? A badge helped you,” says Len, clearly interested but opting to play at being disinterested in the actual conversation.

One of the reasons Rosa preferred dealing with Lisa for prison breaks was at least she was straight forward – asking Captain Cold for a favour always was double-edged.

“Barry Allen, I swear he’s our very own Flash repellent,” says Sam while admiring the haul and missing the contemplative cold look Len was shooting him.

“I said no collateral civilian damage,” snaps Len.

“We didn’t hurt him – he looked like he needed a good rough and tumble,” says Rosa with a feral grin – a marked difference from Lisa’s playful manner.

“He had quite the mouth on him,” adds Sam with his own smirk.

Len’s posture stiffened from its leisurely sprawl and stands up with a barely concealed scowl of annoyance, already contemplating wiping that smirk of Scudder's face. Except Mick takes this moment to wander in from what passes as the kitchen in their safehouse and laughs, “Sounds like our hostage from the bank.”

“Same guy,” Sam agrees, since Barry confirmed that. “He’s cute.”

Len’s vein is about to start throbbing in his forehead. Barry isn’t ‘cute’. Well, he is, to Len. Scudder isn’t allowed that kind of familiarity with Allen. “ _Adorable_ ,” he scowls unattractively. “We can’t all kidnap the same guy.”

“Why not?” Rosa drops onto the nearest couch with a sigh, happy to have her feet up. Despite looking good, running in heels isn’t as fun as it seems.

“It’ll look suspicious.”

“I’m telling you, he’s our good luck charm,” Sam tries to reason. He hates arguing with Snart. “Even Piper has a good luck charm for getaways.”

Len knows the secret will come out anyway so, “Yes, he does. His getaway charm is also Barry Allen.”

“Wha– the same Barry? Our Barry?” Rosa is indignant. Len glares at her.

“ _My_ Barry,” snaps Len.

“Your Barry?” Mick asks with an amused eyebrow quirk. “Since when?”

“Since I said so,” he growls out before stomping out.

***

And oh – then it’s a new rule. No kidnapping Barry Allen unless Snart is there.

***

A rule that the Rogues promptly break by next Tuesday.

***

“Hey heist buddy.”

“Please don’t call me that, Shawna.” Barry really would like to not be tied up but here he is, in civilian clothes, with Iris tied up next to him. All he wanted was to see the new exhibit at this museum, okay? Have a nice evening with his best friend. Was that too much to ask? Why were the Rogues even interested in this field of science? 

“You should hear what Rosa calls you. But don’t worry,” she winks, “I’m not allowed to take you hostage for the getaway. Hartley’ll be so disappointed you’re not in the car with us though.”

“Not… allowed?”

“Boss’s new rule.”

“Boss as in… Captain Cold?” Barry hedges but mentally doesn’t want the answer.

“Mhmm.” She’s liberating a few pieces from their display cases, disappearing and reappearing around the room.

“He’s made a rule. About kidnapping me.” Barry is going to have words with Cold about that.

Iris sighs and leans back against the wall they’re lined up against with the other hostages – all of whom are giving Barry very weird looks. “Your life, Barr.”

“Bye kiddos! I’ll tell the boss you say hello!” Shawna blows a kiss at Barry and disappears in a plume of smoke.

***

“So where is the Flash?” asks Mardon, holding a lightning storm over the exhibit’s crowd while Shawna loots the glass cases with a crowbar while Barry being tied up by Mardon.

“C’mon, you’re his boss,” says Shawna. “You should dock his pay. He’s not very punctual.”

“It doesn’t work like that–” Barry stutters and winces at the tsunami of broken glass that Shawna wreaked on the room. “I just inherited Star Labs and don't actually – oh my God, Mardon, can you _please_ untie me already? Doesn’t Cold have a no kidnapping rule?”

“I’m just gift wrapping you, buddy,” smirks Mardon now that Barry is trussed up between the guardrail of the museum balcony. The half of the patrons have since fled when Weather Wizard crashed the exhibit opening.

Barry sighs, having heard who he was being 'wrapped' for. “I’m not dating Snart.”

“Did you guys break up?” asks Mardon. “Relationships take work. Compromise.”

“Like how I wanted to rob the Fox Lampert jewellery store on 5th and Mark wanted to lift a painting.”

“Best of both worlds,” says Mark with a besotted look towards Shawna as he smashes another case of priceless jewellery from the Byzantine era.

“I wasn’t dating him,” Barry reiterates.

“Not with that attitude, you aren’t,” says Peek-a-Boo boosting one of the paintings from the wall. 

“Please don’t steal in front of me. The DA already hates my guts.”

“Aw, honey, just tell ‘em you were tied up,” teases Peek-a-Boo. “Perfect alibi.”

Barry wonders if he can vibrate out of the ropes to end his own misery. The balcony is on the fifth floor. If he’s lucky, he could at least get a day off.

***

Barry is in an awkward predicament on Monday morning.

“Tell me again, Allen, why you were at the robbery?” snarls District Attorney Cecile Horton pointing at the CCTV footage displayed on the monitor in Singh’s office. It doesn’t paint Barry in a very flattering light.

“I was tied up,” replies Barry.

“A feat that only you seem to fall into,” mutters another lawyer from Horton’s entourage.

“And don’t get me started on Leonard Snart!” snaps Horton. “Can you go anywhere without ruining months of work to get him arrested? It ends up looking like entrapment! Bad enough that his records and open cases disappeared due to my predecessor’s incompetence.”

Barry just sinks further into his chair. It doesn’t help that the officers in the bullpen are taking bets on whether Horton or Singh will kill him first. He really hopes that Joe hasn’t told Cecile about why Barry keeps getting into these situations. That’s really a two-month anniversary talk. He imagines. Barry’s never really made it to that relationship milestone.

“It’s not like that! How was I supposed to know you were staking out Saints & Sinners!”

“Good God, Allen,” mutters Singh from the corner, rubbing his temples. 

“It’s bad enough the Rogues are making a farce out of the police by taking one of our own as hostage but being seen colluding with Snart! The mayor’s office will not stand for this injustice,” says Horton with a huff, her eyes boring into Barry’s soul. Barry feels guilty for everything. Even the pen he stole from Ramirez’s desk.

“Keep your house in order, Singh. Or the mayor will hear from me,” says Horton before swanning out of the captain’s office with her entourage in tow.  

“I wasn’t colluding. I barely even know Snart–”

“Allen, just shut up,” sighs Singh. Barry’s mouth clicks shut. It’s a great start for the week.

***

Len had been planning this heist off and on for the better part of a month. He had the timings down to the second. All that was missing was the Flash.

Who was late.

Later, than usual.

“Are we still doing this?” grumbles Mick from driver’s side of the nondescript van the Rogues’ had stolen specifically for the night. Len’s leaning on the hood looking at his watch.

“Are you getting cold feet, brother dear?” asks Lisa with a bored sigh when Len ignores his partner’s question. “I’m sure the Flash doesn’t mean to be this late.”

Len jaw twitches at the mere implication that Barry Allen is standing him up on a heist that took a month to plan.

“To be honest, I bet he’s busy running off to save Allen. That kid’s probably gotten nabbed by Scudder and Dillon again,” says Mick flicking his lighter with a smirk, knowing Len tensed at the mention of Mirror Master.

“Say that again, Mick,” he grounds out, looking like he swallowed a bitter lemon.

“You know, Allen? The Doc’s kid? Mardon trussed him up for the pickings when he and Shawna boosted that Van Gogh last night,” says Mick, idly waiting for his friend’s reaction. “I don’t think Mardon got the memo about not taking hostages. Allen's a favourite now.”

“That’s just peachy,” Len mutters mulishly with a click of his gun before dramatically storming off, heist forgotten. Mick and Lisa exchange a knowing look.

“Just so we’re clear, we’re going to have to live with this,” sighs Lisa watching her brother walk off into the night.

“Yeah – until he pulls his head out of his ass,” agrees Mick, sagely.

“Oh absolutely,” says Lisa.

***

“We need to talk.”

Len looks up from his carefully balanced lounging on the couch at the sudden entrance of one Barry Allen into his warehouse. Where he’s alone. He wonders if Barry scoped the place out first, because he’s not in his Flash suit.

Either way, Len stands up and puts his magazine aside, crosses his arms. “I heard you were all tied up.”

Barry scowls. “And then some. That’s why I’m here. You need to get them to stop. I’m this close to losing my job.”

Len narrows his eyes, he will not be cowed by Barry Allen’s doe eyes and pout. “So stop showing up in civilian clothes to heists.”

“Wha – I’m not planning this! This isn’t a thing I do on purpose! The Rogues are stalking me!”

Barry wasn’t planning this? That’s news to Len, who figured with how many times it had happened… could it really be coincidence? “Why would my Rogues stalk you?”

“You tell me!”

He opens his mouth, about to inform Barry of his ‘good luck charm’ status when a thought occurs to him and he clicks his mouth shut again.

Len’s going to kill those bastards. Starting with Mick.

“What?” Barry asks warily to his muted silence.

“Nothing.”

“You look ready to murder.”

“I am ready to murder,” he grits out, his mind already whirling at the possibilities.

“Leonard? Len?”  His attention is snapped back to the present at Barry’s soft tenor.

Len wishes he had any better way to say this. “They’re playing… matchmaker.”

“I– oh.”

To his surprise, Barry doesn’t seem so surprised at all. In fact, he’s scratching the back of his head and muttering “told Mark we weren’t dating” under his breath.

Len arches his eyebrow. “They told you?”

“No! No, not so… much. Mark might’ve hinted. And– Shawna probably thought that was a date with Iris, and Rosa seems jealous sometimes and– Wow. All of them have hinted. Hartley’s comments about – oh that suddenly makes a lot more sense.”

And now Barry blushes, of course. It’s more attractive than Len imagined it being.

Len itches to show Piper the business side of his gun for whatever salacious comments he made, but also sort of wants to thank him because now he’s been gifted with the sight of a flustered Barry Allen putting something together inside his head.

“I’ll call them off. Make them plan heists that don’t involve stalking your social life.”

“Right. um. thanks. Or–”

“Or?”

“Never mind.”

“Barry?”

He looks nervous, casting a glance to the side. “I just– y’know, they might stop if we actually–”

Len steps around the coffee table, trying to hold himself in check. “Actually?” he prompts because Barry seems to be warring with himself internally. He’s always rushing in, so to see him conflicted is a bit new to Len, really.

“My job–”

“The Rogues can keep a secret.” That sounded too eager. Len berates himself internally of the unwanted effect that Barry has on him.

Barry scoffs. “Yeah right.”

“They can when I make them,” Len says with conviction, staring intently into Barry’s eyes.  

Barry swallows. “I want to keep my job. But I also think I might want to–”

He steps forward and Len forgets to breathe for a second because Barry Allen plants a flutter-light kiss right on his lips, hands gentle on the sides of Len’s face before retreating just as quickly. That fragile line of cat and mouse that they’d been toeing since Kahndaq Dynasty Diamond vanished in that instant.

He’s smiling. Of course he is. He’s Barry Allen. He looks dazzling. Len is going to murder the Rogues and then resurrect them with the Oculus to thank them.

“Tell them to stop kidnapping me and maybe we can see where this goes.”

“I can keep them in line,” drawls Len dragging his thumb along Barry’s cheek in a quick, affectionate stroke. “With the proper motivation.”

Barry’s answering smile is all Len needs because then they're kissing, like it's the easiest thing in the world.

***

End.

**Author's Note:**

> come say hi on our tumblrs: [coldtomyflash](http://coldtomyflash.tumblr.com/) & [swingsetindecember](http://swingsetindecember.tumblr.com/). 
> 
> comments are always appreciated. thank you for reading.
> 
> if the mood strikes you, you should have a listen to Accessory by Jordyn Taylor. it would be the perfect montage song for the ensuring crime spree that barry gets caught up in.


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